


To the Handmaiden

by Namalinette



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: F/F, Kinda, Letters, Love Letters, Romance, Secret Admirer, Secret love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-08-14
Packaged: 2020-08-23 14:41:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 471
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20244517
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Namalinette/pseuds/Namalinette
Summary: "A Countess should be free to do whatever she wishes, as her word is the law."I am sure this is the dreamy ideal that many young girls believe, but you and I honestly know it to be false. There is much that I cannot do. I cannot travel, I cannot visit my own city, I cannot love whom I choose. If I could, It would be you. My handmaiden, with whom my wellbeing is so readily entrusted. You, who I pay to keep me healthy, punctual and sated. I have never befriended a servant before, but in this foreign Kingdom I allowed you to become my beacon of stability. I would choose you. You. Not the young magician or my foolish husband. Only you, my trusted handmaiden.In which Nadia writes letters to Portia that she will never send, detailing her discovery about falling in love and the woes of being bound by duty.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I'm a big sap for these two...

To my trusted handmaiden,

My family always taught me that love is the most powerful force; No, it can’t break walls; No, it can’t move mountains; No, it can’t conquer kingdoms. Whenever I asked them, then, how is it strong at all, they told me I would see for myself one day in the future. Love was ugly to me then; It was boys and girls and kissing and screaming.

I never wanted to fall in love. I see all of these people swooning and I laugh; They must not know how foolish they look. Not me. I have always been too strong to fall in love, too clever to play the fool. Somewhere, though, within my core, I wanted to. Needed to. Craved to feel this strong force and understand it’s mysteries.

Meeting you wasn’t in my plan. It didn’t line up with my perfect life schedule, but with every word you spoke I cared less and less for life. Less for riches and less for power. By that time I realised the danger of your caress I was too caught to free myself. Too deep to want freedom. Finally, I feel this ineffable force. It cannot break walks, or move mountains or conquer kingdoms. No.

Instead, my dear, for you I would open doors, I would climb mountains and I would build palaces.

Yours eternally, Countess


	2. Jewels for the Handmaiden

To my trusted handmaiden,

I can never allow you to see these letters. They are my escape from the reality that my position leaves me in; I cannot have you, even if you did want me.

Last month your eyes lingered upon jewels displayed behind glass. Perhaps I should have been focusing upon the decree my darling husband was declaring, but I could only notice how your gaze remained turned from me. I do concede, in the privacy and safety of this letter, that I felt the softest prickle of jealousy upon the flesh of my heart. It is immature to wish that you might look upon me with such awe. However, upon glancing across the display of finely cut gems I felt that jealousy swiftly recede. Are those the things that you like? Is this what you perceive to be beautiful?

Today I finally found cause to part with the gift that I so impulsively purchased; I should not have spent money on such a romantic whim, but the urge had seized me before my mind had the opportunity to resist. The gleam in your eyes, the red shock in your cheeks...I would like to see it again. From now until the day you insist I stop, I would rather enjoy showering you in gifts, in the faintest hope of glimpsing your endearing surprise just once more.

Anything that you want. I will buy it all for you.

Yours eternally, Countess.


End file.
